


Familiar

by choir



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Getting Back Together, Kuroo as Akaashi's step-brother, M/M, Post-Break Up
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-30
Updated: 2019-03-30
Packaged: 2019-12-25 20:22:15
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,794
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18268697
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/choir/pseuds/choir
Summary: Twenty times Keiji doesn’t forgive Koutarou, and five times he does.





	Familiar

**Author's Note:**

  * For [BnessZ](https://archiveofourown.org/users/BnessZ/gifts).
  * Inspired by [heavy heart, a love apart](https://archiveofourown.org/works/5168537) by [keptein](https://archiveofourown.org/users/keptein/pseuds/keptein). 



> Phew, this fic is finally complete. (Don't worry, there's a very happy ending)
> 
> I need to go through a few things before we start:  
> 1\. HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO MY LOVELY NESS. This fic originally started as a 500 word drabble meant to make you feel things; it exploded into an entire world. Thank you for being my writing buddy. Happy 24th birthday.
> 
> 2\. This fic is partially inspired by my lovely friend's breakup fic of a different name, [heavy heart, a love apart](https://archiveofourown.org/works/5168537) which I have read and loved for years.
> 
> DISCLAIMER: **Please do not take this fic as a be-all-end-all for how romantic relationships are supposed to operate.** Always put your own happiness and wellbeing first.

1\. Tetsurou comes up to him. He’s struggling to keep his expression level, but Keiji always has seen right through him.

Koutarou is late. Keiji isn’t worried; Koutarou is always late. Even so, he’s going to kill him later for being late on a day like today. Keiji is sure Koutarou will burst through the doors laughing, tie messed up and suit wrinkled, because that’s how Koutarou moves through life: chaotic and a bit of a disaster, but it works, somehow. Keiji bites the inside of his cheek.

Tetsurou says something. Keiji blinks, then laughs, dry and disbelieving. It echoes through the hall, loud against the silence, and suddenly everyone is staring.

It doesn’t make sense.

Tetsurou says the same thing, voice raising an octave, but not enough that people can hear him.

Keiji didn’t want a big event. They planned it for Koutarou—to have all eyes on him.

Now, all the eyes are on Keiji.

He swallows, once, twice. Turns to stare at the pews, stretching out before him. Wonders if this is what breathing underwater feels like. He hears Tetsurou speaking softly in his ear, pulling him down from the altar. Feels hands on his shoulders, gripping tightly and telling him to breathe.

It’s only then that he realizes he’s gasping for air, vision blurring over.

 

 

 

 

2\. Keiji throws the ring away when he gets home. The suit ends up ripped in half by the time he’s finished screaming. It’s almost four in the morning and Keiji is so drunk he can barely stand. His ears are still ringing from the bar and he can’t hear anything but his heartbeat, loud and incessant.

He opens the closet: Koutarou’s things aren’t there. He sucks in a deep breath, and hears himself swearing, cursing everything to hell.

Keiji can’t bring himself to throw away the pictures. He throws them in an old storage bin, frames and all, trying not to flinch when he hears the glass shattering.

He asks Tetsurou to pick up the box. Keiji doesn’t ask what he does with it.

 

 

 

 

3\. Sometime between now and back then Keiji is crying.

Days blur together. He feels ridiculous.

Sometimes he thinks he wants closure.

Most of the time he just wants to never see Koutarou again.

 

 

 

 

4\. He spends the next month in a bar. Tetsurou joins him, sometimes. They sit in silence for the first few weeks. Tetsurou tries to cut him off on weeknights, begging mixed with frustration or sadness or both, but it only works half the time. Keiji appreciates it, even if he never says it.

They never talk about Koutarou. Tetsurou starts talking again at some point, going on and on about his annoying coworkers, Oikawa and Iwaizumi, and Kenma, if he’s in town to visit. He avoids talking about how his boyfriend proposed to him last week. Keiji appreciates it, even if he wants nothing but happiness for his stepbrother.

( _Daichi-san is good to Tetsurou_ , Keiji tells himself, fighting the urge to tell Tetsurou to be careful who he gives his heart to. Tetsurou has always been the trusting one.)

His parents clean his room and remove all the old pictures of Koutarou. His mom makes nanohana with mustard dressing every day. Every time Keiji drinks too much, Tetsurou drops him off at their parents’, and his mother waits at the table to make sure he eats. Every now and then, his stepfather will be there, drinking coffee and staring up at Keiji with pity.

It doesn’t make him feel any better about himself to be at his childhood home, but at least here, he has some memories before Koutarou.

In his house, he doesn’t have that luxury.

 

 

 

 

5\. Koutarou still doesn’t call.

 

 

 

 

6\. He comes out at thirteen. Keiji believes his relatives are supportive for a while, but then he overhears his aunts and uncles apologizing to his mom for her lack of future grandkids. His mom is furious, and refuses to talk to any of them for weeks.

At eighteen that his relatives tell him he won’t be with Koutarou forever; nothing when you’re young lasts.

But Keiji is nothing if not petty. When they get engaged some years after college, he shakes hands with every family member in the room at a New Year’s party, fidgets constantly with the ring when he talks. The ring Koutarou picks out is simple: a silver infinity band with a small, white stone.

Being the center of attention has never been Keiji’s style. He likes the quiet that comes with being out of the spotlight; but in that moment, he thinks he understands why Koutarou craves it. He hears the whispers but doesn’t care; assumes the gossip but knows it can’t harm him. He realizes that holding onto power on center stage means that he holds his own happiness above the judgement of others.

Koutarou is with his family that year, so Keiji calls him at midnight, shivering outside in the snow and watching how brilliant the silver shines even at night.

“Keiji—you did what?” Koutarou is laughing, big guffaws that Keiji knows are shaking his entire body.

“I simply,” Keiji twirls the ring on his finger, “made it known I am permanently off the market.”

Koutarou falls silent. In retrospect, Keiji should have known that any time Koutarou doesn’t immediately reply is a red flag. An immediate sign that something is wrong.

At that moment, however, he doesn’t, too caught up in the glee of his faux victory over his family and the feeling of knowing that Koutarou is going to be by his side forever.

Hindsight is always twenty-twenty.

 

 

 

 

7\. Keiji kisses Koutarou first, before they start dating.

It’s after a big win and they’re caught up in the adrenaline, and then Keiji is pushing Koutarou against the wall and it’s so much better than the awkward kisses under the covers with his childhood friends. Koutarou is real, strong and broad and when Keiji presses his fingers into Koutarou’s back, all he feels are tight lines of muscle from hours of practice.

 _With you_ , his brain helpfully supplies. _Always with you_.

He breaks apart, and Koutarou puts him back together again.

 

 

 

 

7.5. Keiji doesn’t think when he’s with Koutarou.

In some sense, that’s the exact opposite of the truth: he’s an analytical setter and person, always thinks before he acts. Koutarou drags him around, sure, but it’s never without Keiji agreeing first.

Watching Koutarou play feels like watching universes explode and come together all at the same time; he’s loud, obnoxious, doesn’t listen at first. His power is uncontrolled, sparks out like electricity, and it acts without impulse. Keiji can’t help but feel drawn in, first out of a sense of pride as the one who will wield it, later as the one who simply gives it the starting point.

_Akaashi! Toss it to me!_

Keiji always obliges.

 

 

 

 

8\. “I expected you to reach out to him by now.”

Keiji _supposes_ that expecting Akinori to stay silent for so long really is pushing it, anyways.

“Konoha- _san_ ,” Keiji warns, and he smiles even if he feels the familiar anger beginning to loom over him.

“Listen, Akaashi,” Akinori starts, and Keiji can see the frustration on his face and in the way his hands curl around his fork, stabbing at the pasta on the plate in front of him. “I hate Kou for what he did to you. But frankly, seeing you like this is—”

He pauses, as if collecting his thoughts, then sighs.

Keiji knows the words hovering at the end of the unfinished sentence: pathetic.

“Excuse me?” Keiji spits out. His voice rises higher; a few people in the restaurant turn their heads. 

“Oh—” Akinori seems taken aback. “Listen… all I’m saying is, we’re here for you. It’s just hard to see you like this.”

“It’s been barely two months.” Keiji can’t hold back the venom in his voice anymore; he tries to keep it under wraps, but what starts as a slow trickle turns into a waterfall. “What would you know? You weren’t even there.”

 _Ah, shit_.

“Keiji—”

The look on Akinori’s face confirms it: hurt, betrayal, and something deeper under the surface that Keiji is too furious to attempt to identify. Keiji stands, slams money down on the table, and leans over closer to Akinori.

“If you see Bokuto-san,” Keiji hisses out, “please avoid mentioning you saw me.”

Keiji calls Tetsurou when he leaves the restaurant, angry, stinging tears threatening to fall. People blur as he races down the street, every word out of his mouth becoming more and more choked up. By the time he reaches Tetsurou’s apartment, he’s breathless and pretending his cheeks aren’t wet.

 

 

 

 

9\. Daichi is at a friend’s that night, and Keiji has never been happier that he gets his brother when he needs him; they drink hot chocolate and lie on the couch and watch old Samurai movies and Keiji can imagine that they’re fifteen again, playing a movie on near silent so as not to wake up their mother. Neither of them were rebellious teenagers, and their parents often joked as much. Watching movies when they weren’t supposed to became their only form of dissent.

“Maybe you should start thinking of him as Bokuto-san again.”

The words cut through Keiji like a knife, only visible in how his eye twitches against his will.

“I know you don’t like it, but it might help,” Tetsurou adds. “For his friends, too.”

“Okay.”

He tests it on his tongue. _Bokuto_.

 _Bokuto-san_.

“Bad?”

“No,” Keiji says, leaning his head on Tetsurou’s shoulder. “It’s better.”

 

 

 

 

10\. Bokuto’s favorite season is summer.

Keiji doesn’t like the heat, but Bokuto would use every excuse to go to the beach to play volleyball.

 _We can play on a team of just you and me_ , Bokuto would say.

Summer goes by.

Keiji spends all of it at Tetsurou’s, indoors.

He sells his house.

 

 

 

 

11\. He finally moves out of Tetsurou’s and gets a new apartment.

His boss gives him a raise, and he moves to a nicer part of town. His new place has a balcony, a washer in unit, a dishwasher. The first thing he decorates is the balcony; puts out chairs and a table before he unboxes everything else. He spends hours outside reading, his own personal escape from everything happening in his life.

A part of him wishes he still had his old ring, even if he isn’t sure what he’d do with it. He doesn’t want to think about how it’s at the bottom of a landfill, by now.

Tetsurou goes through his things to make sure no remnants of Bokuto remain. His meticulousness is apparent, even now; no photos stuck between clothes appear, and all of Bokuto’s ties that he left are gone. Every sock has a partner. Photo albums have been carefully reorganized, though there are a few years of Keiji’s life now missing.

He spends hours looking through the memories he has left instead of digging out more pots and pans to make dinner. One of Keiji’s favorite photos of him and Tetsurou is a double date they had at an amusement park; Tetsurou had been dating someone else at the time, and asked her to take a picture of them.

Nineteen-year-old Keiji smiles begrudgingly at the camera; Tetsurou’s arm is wrapped around his shoulder. They look happy, if not a bit sweaty from the heatwave that hit that year. Bokuto is on the other side of the camera, along with Tetsurou’s ex.

The memory doesn’t hurt him as much as he thought it would.

He notices that the pain has settled into a slow simmer, rather than a burn, in that moment.

 

(Later that night he thinks: maybe it’s always been okay that him and Koutarou aren’t—weren’t—perfect.

Maybe, if anything, he simply expected too much of them too fast. To be married, to have a house, a family, to grow up sooner than is necessary, to always stay the same. He wonders, then, if Koutarou ran because he was scared.)

 

 

 

 

11\. “You don’t have to avoid talking to me about your wedding.”

“Ah— _Keiji_ , you know I would never…” Tetsurou trails off, his smartass tongue failing him, for once.

“I want to… talk about it.”

Tetsurou’s eyes widen, and before Keiji can stop it the floodgates have opened; Tetsurou complains about everything from Daichi’s flower selection to the venue to the guest list, which ones of their relatives they should or should not invite, his trouble finding a tuxedo, his inexplicable fear of Sugawara, Daichi’s best friend.

It’s nice, to talk about it with Tetsurou. To see him excited.

Keiji smiles, and Tetsurou’s eyes immediately start watering.

“Are you… smiling?”

“Yes?” Keiji frowns.

“No, no — bring the smile back! Don’t frown! I’ll keep talking about how terrified I am of Suga-chan if that’s what it takes —”

“Tetsurou.”

“Yes?”

“Sugawara-san is almost half your size.”

Tetsurou stares, then bursts out laughing; the sound rakes up and down Keiji’s body. He can’t believe that he didn’t realize this before, but: he is lucky. So incredibly lucky. In some weird, fucked up way, even if Bokuto is gone, he gets Tetsurou. He gets Tetsurou and his ridiculous snorting laughter and strange constant bedhead and his infuriating opinions about movies.

That’s more than enough.

 

 

 

 

12\. Keiji goes with Tetsurou to try on suits. It’s a ridiculous endeavor; Tetsurou ends up in tears from laughter when he tries things on that don’t fit right, or simply look awful. The poor salesperson barely gets Tetsurou into more than a half dozen fits that day—and only after multiple stages of begging.

Of course, Tetsurou hates all of them. Keiji can’t help but roll his eyes: only Tetsurou would be able to tell the intricate differences in how his torso looks in each suit, even if no one else can.

“I never thought I would say this,” Keiji says, “but you’re more stubborn than Sugawara-san.”

“Than _Suga-chan?_ ” Tetsurou feigns getting hit by a bullet, collapsing onto a chair in true dramatic fashion.

“You two would’ve been able to discuss the slight differences between all of your choices.”

“Suga can’t offer the same level of snark that you do, Keiji,” Tetsurou shakes his head. “What would I do without you?”

“Cry?” Keiji offers, but he’s smiling now, despite himself.

“Hmm …” Tetsurou moves back to the rack, cycling through his previous choices. He pulls out choice #3 for the fifth time. “Daichi would like this one on me.”

“Then maybe that one’s the winner,” Keiji shrugs, not thinking much about it. “I didn’t put much thought into mine. I knew Koutarou would have liked anything I chose.”

Keiji doesn’t notice the slip, but Tetsurou does: when his eyes snap up to meet Keiji’s, his gaze is sharp enough to make Keiji shiver.

“Yeah,” Tetsurou says, with forced optimism. “You’re right. Daichi is the same.”

 

 

 

 

13\. Keiji tears up at the wedding. It’s a mix of things—jealousy over what he doesn’t have, but mostly happiness for Tetsurou. It’s small, barely thirty people, so Keiji can’t completely cover up how red his eyes are after the ceremony.

He gives a toast to Tetsurou and his husband. Tetsurou cries, big gross tears sliding down his face as Keiji metaphorically passes off his brother and best friend to someone else. It isn’t true, not in a literal sense, but Tetsurou will be gone for three weeks on honeymoon and Keiji isn’t sure if he’ll see anyone else during that time.

Of his and Bokuto’s mutual friends, only Komi is able to make it: Keiji just manages to feel relieved that Konoha doesn’t show.

Keiji exchanges pleasantries with Komi, mostly because it feels like the right thing to do. Komi doesn’t bring up anything about Bokuto, sticking to safer subjects like work and the food available at the buffet. Some part of Keiji wants to ask—have you seen Bokuto? talked to him? is he okay?

He bites down on his tongue, silencing the words. Bokuto’s number is blocked in his phone; even if he were to reach out, Keiji wouldn’t know.

(It’s a suggestion from Tetsurou. Keiji isn’t sure he agrees with it, even now, but he still can’t look at Bokuto’s number—the only one he’s ever memorized save for his brother’s—without feeling sick.)

 

 

 

 

13\. Keiji gets back late.

He’s a little tipsy but otherwise happy for the first time in months. Fumbling for his keys, he’s slow to realize there’s someone outside his door.

The world sways out from under him.

“I know Tetsurou got married today, so I wasn’t sure what time you’d be back, but I—“

It takes a minute for the confusion to settle in before it morphs into pain. Keiji simply stares, wondering if the butterflies in his stomach are the same ones as when he saw Bokuto for the first time at 15, jumping high in the air and grinning. Like ice water to the face. It feels as though it’s worlds away from where they are now.

He’s dizzy by the time the gears in his head slow down, catching up to the present.

Then Bokuto’s words register.

Anger flares quicker than he remembers, like jumpstarting a pulse. The word _Tetsurou_ feels like poison. In the back of his mind, the budding forgiveness and relief that Bokuto is okay gets shoved underneath the months of hurt.

“You mean _Kuroo_ ,” Keiji grinds out. “ _Tetsurou_ is mine. Don’t pretend like you still—“

Adrenaline is rushing to his fists, where they curl tightly at his sides. He’s never been as strong as Bokuto, but in that moment, he knows where he could land a punch that would hurt Bokuto enough so they would be even.

“Keiji…”

Bokuto looks blurry. Keiji belatedly realizes he’s crying.

“Can we at least talk?”

“No.”

“I—please.”

Keiji doesn’t reply. He’s so caught up in trying to keep himself from lunging at Bokuto that he forgets to ask how Bokuto knows where he lives.

“Keiji—I made a mistake.”

Keiji whips his head up, eyes narrowing. Blood roars in his ears and he imagines every possible way he could turn Bokuto away and crush him, in the process. _A mistake_. A _mistake_ , after everything.

“Why.” Keiji struggles to keep his voice level.

 _Don’t scream_.

Months of no contact. From having his best friend beside him to having nothing at all, scrambling to pick up pieces the pieces. The deed to the house. Which friends he can keep. His relationship with Tetsurou, full of banter and snark, transitioning into Tetsurou rubbing his back while he cries.

Keiji is an ugly crier, like his brother. It shows on their faces the next day.

“I was scared—I didn’t know what to do—I’m sorry.”

Bokuto’s panicked voice hasn’t changed since they were teenagers; on instinct, worry surges through him in waves, almost overtaking the anger. Almost. The habitual urge to comfort Bokuto pulls at him, like he used to to on and off court.

It feels like defeat. Keiji wipes the tears off his cheeks and sighs, just breathing for a moment. The anger returns to a low simmer; Keiji feels dazed from the emotional whiplash.

“Everything was moving so fast, and it felt like you were moving even faster, and I … felt like I couldn’t keep up. But it doesn’t excuse what I did. I’m sorry.”

Bokuto trails off; Keiji stares at him, stunned. It’s a point blank reminder that they aren’t in high school anymore, or even a college volleyball team; there’s no trace of the naivety on Bokuto’s expression, only hard set determination.

 _Koutarou_ —

“I don’t expect you to forgive me,” Bokuto continues. “But I wanted to—”

Keiji wants to kiss him. The realization hurts almost as much as knowing he can’t. He holds his ground, feels lightheaded from confusion. The anger screams at the sad, desperate part of him that just wants his fiancé back, but it’s impossible to know which side is right, which side to listen to.

There’s a compromise somewhere between the two sides warring in him, but he isn’t sure what it is.

“I need time.” Keiji hates how his voice sounds: weak and soft.

“Okay.”

The Koutarou he knows hates compromise. This one, standing in front of him, looks the same but feels so far away. This Koutarou turns and walks away when Keiji asks him to leave, without asking another question.

(Despite this: his eyes are just as intense and wide and beautiful as Keiji remembers them.)

 

 

 

 

14\. Keiji stares at the ceiling of his apartment. It’s been hours. He can’t shake the image of Koutarou staring down at him, begging for—

Something in him freezes. On second thought, he isn’t sure he knows what Koutarou wants.

He turns over, and opens his phone.

 

(>> To: BLOCKED NUMBER

We can talk next week.)

 

Keiji pauses, realizing that he’s already slipped from Bokuto to back to Koutarou.

He sends one more text before he sleeps.

 

(>> To: Sugawara Koushi

Can you meet for coffee?)

 

 

 

 

15\. Keiji doesn’t remember much of his father.

The thing he remembers the most: his mother telling him that if she could do it over again, she would have taken another chance at their marriage. But she never does, she says, out of a blinding, stubborn anger. That stubbornness is passed onto Keiji, as well. His father moves away to America for work and doesn’t look back. She promises Keiji she’ll never change her last name for anyone, anymore.

Keiji never asks why, not even when she remarries when he’s eight and he suddenly has an older stepbrother invading his house and stealing his toys. Tetsurou is his first taste of a hurricane. He gets teased and loved so much more than when it’s just him and his mom, and the first few months are overwhelming. Keiji only begrudgingly follows at first because Tetsurou loves volleyball; he can faintly recall watching it with his father, the last fleeting remnants of a man he never knew.

Something about Tetsurou takes over those memories, and instead becomes equated with _home_. In that part of him that is replaced, through all the sibling fights and bickering, he learns a lesson: love is not inherently complicated, and only forms based on shared experience.

He can’t remember his father’s face, anymore—only the outline of Tetsurou’s back as he follows him, wondering where he will lead this time. The only other person he cares to chase in the same way is Koutarou, many years later, all brash and raw energy, wrapping him up in a world he previously only cared about in passing.

Keiji supposes, then, that different forms of love may all come from a similar origin.

 

 

 

 

16\. They’re sitting in a coffee shop near Keiji’s work. Keiji curls his fingers around the mug of steaming coffee in front of him, nerves sparking from the tension in the room. Sugawara breaks the silence first.

“I didn’t expect you to text me, Akaashi-kun.”

Sugawara is joking, but Keiji can see the worry on his face: in all the time they’ve known each other, Keiji can count the number of times they’ve talked without Tetsurou or Daichi present on one hand. He feels a slight prick of annoyance that Sugawara can see through him so easily. It’s quickly buried under the emotional exhaustion.

Maybe curiosity gets the best of him, or maybe it really is to help him figure out what to do with Koutarou, because the next words out of his mouth make Sugawara stiffen.

“Did you and Daichi date at some point?”

Keiji gets a glare aimed at him, but it’s deserved.

“Yes,” Sugawara says, frowning. “Did Tetsurou tell you?”

“No,” Keiji says, honest. The tension in Sugawara’s shoulders eases, just a bit. “I inferred.”

“We went to the same high school, and dated up until our second or third year of college.”

Sugawara’s eyes narrow, suddenly.

“Are you accusing me of not being happy for him and Kuroo—“

“No,” Keiji says quickly. “I’m not.”

“Then why—”

“Why are you two still friends?” Keiji says in a rush, letting out a breath he didn’t know he’d been holding.

Sugawara stares at him, flabbergasted. And then he _laughs_. Keiji isn’t sure what to do in response. He presses his fingers into the mug, feeling his fingers prick with the telltale sign of a burn.

“It is weird, isn’t it?” the resulting smile on Sugawara’s face is immensely fond, and Keiji almost feels bad for bringing it up. “We didn’t talk for two years afterwards. We both had a lot of resentment to sort through, I think.”

“It was on accident that we reconnected,” Sugawara continues. “I was feeling sentimental and reminiscing and texted him, asking to be friends again. He agreed. It was awkward at first — still is awkward at times — but it’s nice to have my best friend back.”

Keiji stares down at the table. He doesn’t know what to say.

“I don’t know if I’d _recommend_ it, per sé, but it works for us. Don’t get me wrong, though, any romantic feelings have passed and I am very happily single.”

Sugawara sighs, leaning back in the chair. “Both you and Kuroo were ready for marriage so young.”

“If—“ Keiji struggles to find the right words to say, not wanting to give too much away, “if Daichi wanted to—“

Sugawara seems to read his mind. He cuts Keiji off, and the resulting answer is commanding and firm. “I would have said no to getting back together.”

A looming sense of dread crawls its way up from Keiji’s stomach to his chest, settling low in his heart. He struggles to keep his face level, void of any indication of how much Sugawara’s words are affecting him.

“With Bokuto, though…”

Keiji spits out his coffee.

“What?” Sugawara’s face is a picture of innocence.

“This isn’t about Bokuto-san,” Keiji lies through his teeth.

“Oh, it’s not?” Sugawara shrugs, accepting Keiji’s answer at face value.

Keiji feels his face heat up. _Dammit_.

“You’re smart, Akaashi,” Sugawara’s voice is calm, but he has a shiteating grin on his face, “my history with Daichi is different than yours and Bokuto’s. Do what you think is right.”

For someone who acts innocent and easy to understand, Keiji realizes in that moment that there’s a lot more to Sugawara than meets the eye. He’s calculating, but there’s no malice behind it: when he smiles it’s genuine. It reminds him of his brother.

“I was right,” he says aloud to no one in particular, “you and Tetsurou are very similar.”

Sugawara‘s face turns immediately smug. “Now _that_ ,” he says, “is something I’d love to talk about.”

“No.” Keiji raises an eyebrow.

Sugawara groans and begs anyways.

Keiji thinks they might be better friends from here on out.

 

(>> TO: BOKUTO KOUTAROU

The usual place on Friday?

<< FROM: BOKUTO KOUTAROU

Fine with me!)

 

 

 

 

17\. Keiji dreams he’s angry at Koutarou.

Their fights often border on nonsensical; he knows that he isn’t perfect, inheriting a temper from his mother and a stubbornness that comes with having a chaotic older brother. Keiji lashes out at Koutarou when he doesn’t deserve it, just as biting as it is eloquent, because he knows that Koutarou can’t match him in a battle of words.

At the time, Keiji enjoys winning.

He wakes up and feels anxiety rise in him like nausea. It catches at the back of his throat. Rationality tells him feeling guilty as an afterthought doesn’t affect his situation at all; he knows it isn’t the reason Koutarou left.

Rationality fails. The memories of each fight he can recall feels like another punch to the gut, no matter how minor or major they are. Koutarou would always hold his hands tight, when Keiji would get upset, even if they were the middle of an argument. Keiji’s hands always betray him; they shake when he’s angry, feel stabs of pain when he’s sad, turn cold when he’s afraid.

Keiji’s not an idiot. He knows: Koutarou’s heart is as endless as it is kind. Koutarou often gave out forgiveness that Keiji did not deserve.

He longs to talk to Tetsurou, then, like the pain of a missing limb.

 

When Keiji wakes up again his chest feels hollow.

He’s supposed to meet with Koutarou in a few hours. It takes every ounce of will not to run away.

 

 

 

 

18\. Koutarou is late, again, and Keiji feels a tension in his neck that he can’t shake.

He doesn’t want to see Koutarou.

The four espresso shots Keiji took that morning to keep himself awake after a night of no sleep do nothing for the looming sense of dread that Koutarou won’t show, again, and that Keiji has wasted the past however many months mourning someone who is permanently gone from his life. Bile rises in his throat: he thinks he might throw up.

Keiji doesn’t know what to do with the knowledge that Koutarou is an immediate “on” switch for any sort of thought spiral.

“Keiji?”

Keiji looks up; he thinks he forgets to breathe.

Like this, in broad daylight, he’s reminded intimately of how captivating Koutarou has always been to him; he’s smiling sheepishly, eyes wide and alight with some emotion Keiji can’t identify. Keiji is filled with an instinctive desire to reach out and—

“You look nice!” Koutarou blurts out, and Keiji has to hold back a bark of manic laughter.

“Thanks?” Keiji says.

Koutarou is one of the few people who can pull a legitimate conversation out of Keiji—the other being his brother—but he doesn’t remember that now, when it feels like the entire room is pressing in on him. He swears the awkwardness is contagious, and wonders if everyone around them can hear it—

“Keiji,” Koutarou says, and Keiji’s head whips up to meet his eyes. “Don’t be scared, okay?”

Keiji feels his eyes widen, and bites back on a sarcastic remark. He doesn’t want to think about the fact that Koutarou can still see right through him.

“... I’m not,” he says eventually, but it’s with less force than he wants.

Koutarou slides into the seat across from him. Their “usual place” is a small diner a few blocks from their first apartment. The owners know them, and their orders are usually on the table by the time they’ve completely settled in.

It’s been months since Keiji’s been back. There are different servers, now, and they no longer know them by name.

“I’m not expecting anything,” Koutarou says. “From you, I mean.”

Keiji is once again taken aback by Koutarou’s maturity; he blinks, staring down at his hands, clenching and unclenching them on his thighs.

The moment passes as quickly as it comes, and irritation prickles under his skin. He takes a long sip of water to avoid blurting out something he doesn’t mean.

“You—”

“I,” Koutarou starts. He fidgets with his fingers, the slightly bent and crooked ones from years of volleyball, “messed up. I really messed up. And I’m sorry. You don’t have to forgive me, but I wanted to at least say it first.”

Koutarou looks a little blurry. Keiji doesn’t think he could breathe if he tried.

“I was—scared. And unsure. But it felt like things were going so fast, I couldn’t stop it if I wanted to. I wasn’t ready for what you wanted.”

“I’m sorry,” Keiji says, fighting to keep his voice steady. He means it, but he isn’t sure what he’s apologizing for.

“You have nothing to apologize for, Keiji.”

Koutarou looks at him, _really_ looks at him, and Keiji loses his grip on reality. Koutarou’s eyebrows bunch together as his gaze wavers, and eyes bloodshot red. Keiji feels as though he’s in a freefall, unsteady and desperately grasping for control.

It’s okay, Keiji almost says, but it’s not, even if he wants it to be.

He takes a deep breath, remembering Sugawara’s words. The anger is still there, but it’s less all-consuming than before. Thinking through it feels easier; the years-old desire to comfort Koutarou takes over.

“How about,” Keiji says, and he puts on his best nonchalant face, “you talk to me about something else?”

“Keiji—”

Keiji holds up his hand. “I’m trying.”

There’s a beat of silence, and Koutarou gives Keiji a small smile that transforms into a grin.

“About anything?”

“Anything.”

“So, so, you’ll never guess the ridiculous thing that Konoha did the other day—”

There will be a time for a more logistical talk, but Keiji thinks that it can wait.

 

 

 

 

19\. They see each other again the next week, and the week after that, and it feels too easy.

Keiji ignores calls from his brother. His anger loses a grip on him strand by strand, inch by inch. This ‘new’ Koutarou is more self aware and just as infinitely kind; Keiji knows he’s in too far over his head when their hugs and touches start lingering, falling back into familiar habit.

He tells himself that it’s fine.

 

 

 

 

20\. They meet at a bar this time.

Keiji feels giddy, even as he tries to keep it under wraps—he isn’t sure what they’re doing, but it reminds him of when he was a teenager, staring up at Koutarou in awe as he spikes a ball, anxious affection curling in his stomach as he reaches out and longs for something he cannot have. It’s mindless infatuation at first, Keiji thinks, until it transforms. Keiji then starts noticing how Koutarou smiles with his eyes, every odd quirk he exhibits, how he pulls Keiji up if he ever falls behind.

Tetsurou would tell him to be careful, he thinks.

Nervousness transforms itself into one too many drinks— by the time Koutarou walks in, Keiji feels a heavy flush across his cheeks, and Koutarou looks so _nice_ , button down and all. He remembers all the months of drinking with Tetsurou, but the object of his affections is here now, and it’s different from before. He’s about five feet away, talking about sports or a movie he watched last week, and his lips are red and wet; Keiji spends more time staring at them than listening.

“Koutarou,” Keiji interrupts, and he thinks his tongue gets stuck on the words, but Koutarou turns and looks at him, pupils blown wide.

“...Keiji,” he replies, quiet. His fingers twitch against his water glass.

“You … look nice,” Keiji breathes out, letting his eyes linger on the expanse of Koutarou’s collarbone, the popped button on his shirt.

Koutarou leans forward. Praise is Koutarou’s weak point, Keiji thinks, watching as Koutarou swallows in an attempt to form a coherent reply. Faintly, Keiji recognizes that they’ve entered a dangerous territory, teetering on the edge of going one step too far.

“You too,” Koutarou mutters, biting down on his bottom lip.

Another habit. Keiji knows exactly what it means.

Keiji leans closer. Koutarou breathes in sharply.

(Down the rabbit hole he goes.)

Ten minutes later, Keiji has Koutarou pinned against a wall outside the bar, mouth moving against his.

 

 

 

 

21\. Keiji knows this is a bad idea.

It’s a bad idea but he’s pressing Koutarou into the mattress and Koutarou is _submitting_ , without the usual fight; their normal dance for control is nonexistent. Koutarou isn’t even talking, the constant banter instead replaced with writhing as Keiji thrusts into him. Koutarou’s legs shake with the effort of keeping still, the long line of his back damp with sweat.

Being with Koutarou feels overwhelming, the weight of months apart crashing together all at once. Koutarou is dripping onto the bed sheets, soft, barely-there whines rumbling low in this throat, a mess though Keiji has barely touched him, and Keiji feels a premature heat pooling low in his groin. Their sex normally alternates between desperate and slow, depending on who wins control first. For Keiji, it means Koutarou screams. For Koutarou, it means drawn out until Keiji begs. This feels like something entirely different.

All Keiji can think is that it isn’t what he wants.

He’s used to Koutarou’s loud mouth during sex, the constant reassurances and how he repeats Keiji’s name. _Keiji, Keiji, Keiji_. Like a mantra, a prayer. It’s a rare occurrence when Keiji gets him to shut up to the point of incoherence, one that used to be a victory. He wonders if he could get Koutarou to do it again. He wonders if —

Keiji rips Koutarou’s hand from his mouth, thinking he might be stifling his moans; after a moment of silence, noises pour out, then, gasps and moans and high pitched whimpers that force Keiji to bite down on his lip to stay calm. It doesn’t feel exactly like a win, but it’s pretty damn close. Koutarou’s hands grasp for purchase on their discarded clothes as Keiji’s fingers curl around his hips, forcing him back onto his cock, slick noises filling the air as their pace gets faster, faster.

Learning the lines of Koutarou’s body feels new, and Keiji tries to commit the differences to memory. A new angle will send Koutarou scrabbling for something to hold onto, and a bruising slap on his ass will make him keen back onto Keiji’s cock. Keiji peppers kisses along his shoulders, the taste of salt and _Koutarou_ heavy on his tongue.

“Keiji—” Koutarou looks over his shoulder.

The sight makes Keiji still almost immediately. Koutarou looks wrecked, tears at the edges of his eyes and snot and spit a mess around his mouth. His lips are wet and swollen with teeth marks. He looks so intimately vulnerable that Keiji shudders, goosebumps rising on his arms.

“Can I ask— _more_.”

Keiji raises an eyebrow. He’s one push away from being close, but he won’t let Koutarou know that.

“What was that?” he leans closer, breath ghosting over Koutarou’s ear.

The pout that ensues on Koutarou’s face is childish, almost unfitting for the fact that Keiji’s cock is shoved so far up his ass he’ll feel it the next day. He squirms underneath Keiji’s weight, as if only now realizing he’s spent the last however many minutes moaning loud enough for his neighbors to hear. Keiji quietly pockets that in the back of his mind. Maybe he can get Koutarou to let him fuck him in more public spaces.

“You know,” he eventually mutters, turning his face away.

“I don’t, actually,” Keiji says, punctuating it with a slow thrust. He doesn’t miss the slight hitch in Koutarou’s breath, even if he tries to cover it up with a whine.

“Please, just…” Koutarou trails off, letting out a huff.

Keiji feels his heart pounding in his chest.

“ _Please make me come_.”

Something in Keiji snaps.

He’s not sure who moves first, but it ends with Koutarou’s arms pinned behind his back and Keiji slamming into him, and oh, Koutarou truly screams, then, and all thoughts promptly fly out of Keiji’s head. How loud they’re being, how he doesn’t know what will happen after this, where their relationship will lead—

Keiji’s orgasm hits him akin to an explosion, gasping into Koutarou’s hair as his hips still. Koutarou is still whining, shifting back and forth and begging for any sort of friction, and even through the aftershocks it takes everything in Keiji’s body to snake his hand around, pumping Koutarou’s cock until it twitches in his hand. Koutarou cries out, moaning incoherencies; Keiji thinks about never seeing this side of Koutarou again, and his stomach twists in knots.

 

 

 

 

22\. “Was that a good idea?” Koutarou asks. His voice is uncharacteristically small. It makes Keiji want to cry.

Keiji doesn’t reply. He stares at the ceiling of Koutarou’s apartment, willing his heart to still.

“No,” Keiji says, eventually, and his voice chokes up as he does.

“I don’t want you to think that I came back just for this.”

He hates crying—thinks that he’s done it too often in the past year.

“I don’t think that,” he says, and it’s honest.

This is the first time he’s ever thought silence could be so heavy.

“You never said what you wanted,” Keiji continues. “What you wanted from me. We should have discussed that first.”

Come is drying on the inside of his thighs; he’s uncomfortable, but nothing beats the discomfort of not being able to get a read on Koutarou at all. He wonders if the sounds of someone gasping are him.

“Keiji.”

Keiji shuts his eyes. For a moment, he wants to pretend that they can continue on in this grey area between friends and lovers, like what they just did didn’t shatter any previous pretense.

“I’d like to be with you again.”

Yet again, Koutarou’s maturity stuns him, and in a desperate rush of a moment Keiji realizes that he never controlled Koutarou, after all, underestimating him time and time again for years.

“I don’t know if that’s a good idea.”

“Why not?”

“It’s not that _simple_ —”

Goosebumps are starting to rise on Keiji’s arms from the open window. His breath shudders in and out, and when he finally turns his head, the intensity of Koutarou’s gaze on him hurts.

“Why not?” Koutarou repeats, and his voice is heavy, no trace of hesitation. “Why can’t it be?”

Instead of replying, he just stares as Koutarou gets up and dresses himself, refusing to look at Keiji the whole time.

 

Two weeks go by.

 

 

 

 

23\. Sometimes the world doesn’t want him to breathe.

He thinks, for the second time in his life, that this is what suffocating feels like. Mistakes, his own, flash once, twice, three times. Tetsurou would scold him for blaming himself, but he knows, true to face, that no mistake happens in a void—the factors around it define every action, even when the intention begins internally.

He imagines seeing Koutarou. Longs for it, to see if it is possible for a fresh start. Months ago he was too blinded by anger, and he wonders if he’s weak, now, for changing his mind. He wants to imagine his friends agreeing with his choices. His brother. Sugawara. Daichi. Five minutes pass as every possible outcome flies through his head, thinking that maybe all mistakes happen for a reason.

The forced separation—the fleeing, the running away—is a wakeup call. It’s a wakeup call that he doesn't want to ignore. Koutarou knows, but he’s always been more insightful than Keiji in more ways than one. He’s never thought of himself as the idiot before, but this, he thinks, sitting in the dark of his apartment staring at the ceiling, is the only idiotic thing about the entire situation.

There is no such thing as a wrong or right decision, not in this situation—

Something like acceptance—or excitement—or fear—bubbles up in his gut. He wants to change. It would be nice not to worry about the future, the maybe’s and what-ifs. Too often they spiral out of control, in his head. It’s a lesson he can learn in simple-mindedness from Koutarou.

He sits up, takes a deep breath. The constant buzzing at the back of his mind fades, just a bit. It’s five AM, but he’s not tired—he just wants coffee, actually.

Keiji crosses over to the kitchen and adds water to the coffee machine.

Hours later he wakes up to marks on his face from sleeping at the table and cold coffee, still sitting in his mug. Any other morning it would be the first thing to set him off, but he feels… weightless.

He thinks of Koutarou’s bright, warm smile. Feels his heart expand and grow, in his chest.

He calls his brother. It’s already a hot, humid day. It presses in on his lungs, rare for this time of year.

“Do you want to go to the beach today?”

His brother pauses a moment before answering. It’s early, much too early for a night owl like Tetsurou, but when he speaks, Keiji knows he’s smiling. It’s a tone that Keiji hasn’t heard in months: it’s Tetsurou no longer sticking to only saying what Keiji wants to hear.

“Should I bring the volleyball?” he asks. There’s some caution in his tone, still. Keiji almost laughs.

“Of course.”

“I’ll wake up my lazy husband and call Suga.”

“Don’t pretend like you aren’t lazier than Daichi is.”

“Shut up.”

Keiji isn’t sure if this mood will last, but he imagines reclaiming things he previously could only associate with Koutarou, and thinks that it might be a start.

 

 

 

 

24\. “I want to be with Koutarou,” Keiji says.

Laughter and shouts weave their way to where Keiji and Tetsurou sit; Suga and Daichi are yelling about something or another, flinging floaty toys at each other in the water. It’s immature, and the sight would make Keiji roll his eyes any other day, but Tetsurou is pressed up right against his side and his heart feels light.

“Are you sure?” Tetsurou asks. His eyes are warm, overly soft, and Keiji wonders if he’ll ever be able to repay his brother for everything that he’s done.

“Yeah,” he says, biting back a grin when Suga knocks Daichi over by smacking him with an inner tube.

“They never did grow up, did they,” Tetsurou muses, running a hand through Keiji’s hair.

“Koutarou did,” Keiji says. “He surprised me.”

Tetsurou doesn’t reply. He buries his toes in the sand, and for a moment the only sound between them is the distant roar of waves and laughter, bright as the setting sun.

“I’m glad,” Tetsurou says eventually, and his voice wavers at the end. Keiji doesn’t need to look at him to feel Tetsurou’s acceptance— of the two of them, his brother always has been the romantic one.

Keiji smiles in spite of it all.

“You think it’ll work out?” Tetsurou continues.

“Yeah,” Keiji says. “I do.”

 

 

 

 

25\. He’s staring at Koutarou, and Koutarou is staring back at him. It’s not perfect, perhaps won’t ever be, but he’s not scared of whatever they might become.

Koutarou is running, or maybe it’s Keiji, but he’s swooped up in a big hug anyways, and Koutarou is breathing into his neck and it feels so right in a way he thought it never would.

It’s different. And it’s really, really good.

 

 

 

 

 

+26. Keiji wakes up to Koutarou singing in the kitchen.

It’s a new song every day, and Keiji stretches out under the blankets, absorbing the warmth left over from Koutarou’s side of the bed.

Koutarou waltzes back into the bedroom after a few minutes, feeds him miso and rice for breakfast.

Keiji stares at Koutarou’s inviting expression, so desperate to please, and kisses him, mouth warm from coffee and dry from sleep. Trusting again is hard, but on mornings like this, it’s impossible to imagine doing anything but moving forward.


End file.
